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Moonscape
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A song about Roethke's monochrome paintings.
songwriter folk songaweek project
Creative Commons license
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Blues-influenced songster, churning out songs never-before heard about food, love, work, teaching Spanish, and more.
In an effort to get my music out into the world and to hone my writing practice, I'm starting a Song-A-Week project I'll attempt to release one brand new song per week for a year, starting today, Sunday, May 14th, 2006, and continuing through Sunday, May 13, 2007. Traditionally I, like most people, have written about love and sex — attraction, frustration, satisfaction, the works. As evidenced by the first song in my new series (about a job interview for a lame job), I'm trying to break out of this mold a bit more with my new series of songs... that said, I remain ever myself, and surely there will be more songs about love and whatnot.
Song Info
Genre
Acoustic • Acoustic Folk
Charts
Peak #1,271
Peak in subgenre #209
Author
Tom Hinkle
Rights
Tom Hinkle, 2006
Uploaded
November 04, 2006
Track Files
MP3
MP3 2.7 MB • 128 kbps • 2:57
Story behind the song
This is a song about Roethke's paintings. In particular, it's a song about some monochrome grey paintings he did ~1970 shortly before his suicide. I heard from someone the idea that those canvasses are a kind of eerie echo of the images of the moonlanding that were on TV throughout 1969, hence the first line -- "1969, your color TV turned black-and-white." So I just thought about those colors (or the lack of color) and ran with it.
Lyrics
1969, your color TV's turned black and white, all you seem to see is the moon There's so much grey, there's so much white, the feeling's bled out in the night, and all you know is you hope it comes back soon The moon's just a stage for a landing For all those people needing to believe And you can feel more shades of grey than you can see Yeah, you can feel more shades of grey than you can see There's no real color, no real canvas, there's just this hope and heart and sadness, And you can't ever know what it's for And maybe all this is romantic But you'll take romance over stamps and Cambells And all those boys who are so clever... And the people who look at your painting The people strong enough not to turn away They're breaking down in tears in galleries They're breaking down in tears in galleries 1969 your color TV turned black and white All you seem to see is the moon Well distance is easy, close is hard, TV's too small for a human heart Can't you feel the monsters on the loose Well when people step inside what they perceive They end up breaking down in galleries 'Cause you can feel more shades of grey than you can see
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